Toronto cyclist Michael Barry denies claims by former teammate Floyd Landis that he used drugs.

By:Randy StarkmanOlympic Sports Reporter, Published on Thu May 20 2010

In the doping-fuelled world of professional cycling, Toronto’s Michael Barry has always been regarded as something of an anomaly, a guy driven by his passion for the sport who wasn’t willing to sacrifice his principles to get ahead in the peleton.

Now, former teammate Floyd Landis is alleging Barry was part of a group of athletes on the U.S. Postal team — led by seven-time Tour de France winner Lance Armstrong — who doped to boost their performances on the bike.

Barry, reached by the Star after competing Thursday for Team Sky in Stage 12 of the Giro d’Italia, flatly denied he’s ever used drugs in his cycling career.

“For me ever since I was young, cycling is about the journey,” said Barry, whose father Michael Sr. ran a bike store and instilled his love of the sport. “It’s what you get out of the ride, whether it’s a bike race or a long training ride.

“That’s something my father taught me when I was a young kid. That’s always been the most important thing to me. I’ve always made my own finish line. It’s about the feeling of elation when I finish a race and to be able to sleep well at night.”

Barry said he will sleep well despite Landis’ allegations.

“I’ve always raced clean and that was the goal since I was a kid,” said the three-time Olympian. “My mother put those values into me and my mother made me promise I would go back to school the minute I felt I wasn’t progressing. Having their support has been crucial in all this.”

Landis, stripped of his 2006 Tour de France title after testing positive for doping, now admits to doping throughout his career in a series of emails he sent to cycling authorities that have now gone public. He’s also fingering many of his former teammates, most prominently Armstrong, whom he alleges had blood transfusions during the 2003 Tour de France among many other transgressions.

Landis is also claiming that Barry and another U.S. Postal teammate, Matthew White, shared testosterone and EPO with him while training for the Vuelta a Espana in 2003.

Barry said he only rode with Landis one day leading to the Vuelta and that drugs were never part of the equation. He learned about the allegations just before starting yesterday’s 215-kilometre stage in Italy.

“I was shocked when I was told about it,” said the 34-year-old. “But at the same time, Floyd has lied under oath already and he’s pretty much thrown everybody who’s been associated with him in cycling into this. It also doesn’t really surprise me. I also really don’t understand why I’m involved. It’s not true.”

Olympic champion Clara Hughes, who trained with Barry during her cycling days, said she has no doubt he’s clean.

“I have known Michael since he was 15 years old and he has been a teammate, a friend, and a person I have looked to for hope as an athlete,” said Hughes. “Hope that it is possible to play fair and clean and that hard, disciplined work pays off. He is an individual of great integrity and there is simply no way in my mind that there is any basis to any allegations.”

Barry said he wasn’t sure about taking legal action.

“I haven’t really thought about it too much, to be honest,” he said. “It’s really upsetting to read this but I’m not really sure what can be done. I have to discuss that with lawyers.”

While Barry said he wasn’t worried about the allegations hurting his reputation because of his past record and the way he’s carried himself throughout his career, his wife Dede Demet, an Olympic silver medallist cyclist for the U.S., is concerned.

“It’s complete defamation is what it is,” said Demet from their home in Girona, Spain. “And it’s really, really hurtful, especially for someone like Michael, who’s been in the sport for as many years as he has and he’s always done the best he can do to be ethical and to do things the right way on every level. That’s what makes it especially hurtful. You can’t really take it back when your name is smeared in the press.”

Landis said his motivation is to clear his conscience and that he doesn’t want to be part of the problem by remaining silent.

Armstrong spoke to the media Thursday before competing in the Tour of California, making a strong denial as expected.

“It’s our word against his word,” Armstrong said. “I like our word. We like our credibility.”

The Wall Street Journal first reported the details of the emails.

Landis also implicated other cyclists, including long-time Armstrong confidant George Hincapie and Olympic medallist Levi Leipheimer, and acknowledged using human growth hormone starting in 2003. The Wall Street Journal reported another email from Landis also linked another top American racer, Dave Zabriskie, to doping.

Landis said he was asked at one point to stay in an apartment where Armstrong was living and check the temperature in a refrigerator where blood was being stored for future transfusions. “Mr. Armstrong was planning on being gone for a few weeks to train he asked me to stay in his place and make sure the electricity didn’t turn off or something go wrong with the refrigerator,” Landis wrote.

Armstrong said Landis started threatening him and other top riders such as Leipheimer and Zabriskie to make allegations like these long ago.

“I’d remind everybody that this is a man that’s been under oath several times and had a very different version,” Armstrong said. “This is a man that wrote a book for profit that had a completely different version. This is somebody that took, some would say, close to $1 million from innocent people for his defence under a different premise. Now when it’s all run out, the story changes.”

With files from Associated Press

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